However, the planned arrangement of Guides into Chapters doesn't quite meet all the requirements of a FAQ category scheme. Here's a list of reasons why FAQ categories might not match the Guide Chapters exactly. I compiled the list by trying to fit the existing FAQs into Guide Chapters, and by studying the FAQ categories proposed at http://www.livejournal.com/talkread.bml?itemid=7233924:
- Guides don't cover everything. There are no plans yet for an introductory Guide, or for Guides covering client software or embedding, or for Guides explaining how to do things on other websites. Some FAQs do fall into these categories, so we'll need FAQ categories like "About LiveJournal", "Client Software for Windows", and "Working with Other Sites".
- Some topics are covered by more FAQs than Guides, or vice versa, but I've tried to minimize this issue by rearranging the Guides a little. For example, we have 6 FAQs on User Pictures, which justifies making that a category, but only 2 Guides to the same subject, which didn't originally seem to justify creating a Chapter. For consistency, I've now made "User Pictures" a separate Chapter in the list of Guides. For similar reasons, I've moved the "Security Levels" Guide from "Journal Entries" (which is overcrowded with FAQs) to the Chapter dealing with Friends.
- FAQ categories serve an administrative purpose, as well as helping users to find information. Volunteers specializing in particular areas (e.g., "Topic Directory") can be granted permission to maintain FAQs in that specific category. Whether we should break things down so finely for administrative reasons is something we should perhaps reconsider, but I think it's an issue that can be dealt with some other time.
- Guides are organized as logically as possible, which is usually but not always the best way to assist users in looking up questions. Should we try to re-arrange some of the FAQs, for users who don't understand the site well enough to make sense of the "logical" arrangement? Proposals by
leora and
manhattan illustrate two ways we might do this:
- Users can face certain questions (like "Why does my journal suddenly require me to scroll?") without knowing what their problem area is, so perhaps we should place these in a "general troubleshooting" category. Another troubleshooting question that might be considered "general" is "Why am I not showing up in the directory?" Users with other troubleshooting questions should be able to figure out easily enough which category they should look in.
- We could place all picture-related FAQs in a single category. A "Graphics" category would cover not only userpics but also pictures in journal entries (dealt with under "Journal Entries" in the logical arrangement), background images (logically placed under "Customization"), and mood themes (another "Customization" topic).
- FAQ categories should perhaps match Support Request categories in certain cases. So the Guide Chapter called "Customizing your journal" could appear as "Customization" in the list of FAQ categories.
About LiveJournal
Site Navigation Features
Accounts
User Pictures
Journal Entries
Comments
Topic Directory
Friends & Security Levels
Communities
Customization
Client Software
Additional Features (including To-Do List, which can be a separate category for now)
Conflicts with Other Users
Working with Other Sites
<lj-cut> here
About LiveJournal
Site Navigation Features
- How does my Calendar work?
- The interests on your userinfo page
- What is the memory feature and how do I use it?
Accounts
- What are the different account types?
- What's a paid account? How do I get one?
- How can I buy a paid account for somebody else?
- Can I change my username later?
- How do I get started?
- How do I get validated? It says I'm currently not validated!
- Why are there errors when I try to validate?
- Why am I not showing up in the directory? I chose to be listed!
- How do I secure my password and prevent other people from logging into my account?
- I forgot my username / password!
- How can I change my password?
- How can I change the email address that LiveJournal uses?
- Can I delete my entire journal?
User Pictures
- How do I upload my user pictures?
- Can anyone help me create or edit my user picture?
- Why are there errors when I try to upload a user picture?
- How do I post using a different userpic?
- How many user pictures can I have?
- I no longer want a user picture on my journal, can I delete my pic(s)?
Journal Entries
- Why does my journal (or friends view) suddenly require me to scroll?
- Why isn't my entry showing up where it is supposed to?
- Why are my posts showing an incorrect date/time?
- How do I make text bold, italic or centered?
- How do I add pictures to my journal entries?
- How do I add a link to another journal or another web site in my entry?
- How do I add a mood icon to my posts?
- Current music
- What are the LJ-specific Tags?
- What is the Backdate entry option, and how do I use it?
- What's the "Don't auto-format" option do?
- How can I embed a poll into my journal entries?
- Can I edit an old entry I wrote?
- Can I delete an old entry from my journal? From a community?
- Do you delete old journal entries?
Comments
- How do I set up my Message Boards and see comments?
- Can I edit/delete a comment I posted or that was posted in my journal?
- What is Comment IP Logging? What do you mean, "this user is logging my IP address"?
- Can I prevent anonymous people from commenting in my journal?
- Can I prevent all people from commenting in my journal?
- Can I ban specific users from posting in my journal?
Topic Directory
- How does the "Browse By Topic" feature work?
- I don't want to be in topic directory, so could you remove my entry from the listing?
- Will people actually use this?
- Can I be an administrator?
Friends & Security Levels
- How do I manage my Friends List?
- What is the auto add friends link on the bio pages?
- Who can read my journal entries? How can I make things public, private, and protected?
- If someone lists me as a friend will they see my friends only entries?
- My friends only posts are listed as public memories, who will see them?
Communities
- What is a community?
- How do community (shared) journals work?
- Can anyone create a community?
- Can I delete a community?
- How do I post in a community?
- How do I find a community?
- What are the options regarding open and closed communities?
- Can I leave a community?
- How do I configure my community?
- Can I post a "members only" post in a community?
- If I join a community, and make a friends only post in my journal, can the other members of the community see my post?
- Can someone remove or ban another member of a community?
- How do I hand a community over to another user?
Customization
- How do I change the font in my journal?
- How do I add a Background Image?
- How do I change the number of journal entries that are shown?
- How can I change what my "comments" links say?
- Custom Mood Themes
- How do I modify the look of my journal?
- Why can't I use JavaScript in my styles?
To-Do List
- What is a LiveJournal todo list?
- How do I add a todo list item?
- Can I edit a todo list item?
- Are there limits on the number of todo items I can have?
- Can I look at another user's todo lists?
Client Software
Additional Features
- Can I download my entire journal?
- How does the text messaging feature work?
- What are the fast servers?
Conflicts with Other Users
Working with Other Sites